BBC / Sky Sports

[JohnsonsEvilTwin]

I do wonder if the BBC could operate a BBC premium channel that charged an extra £50 a year to enable them to grab back a bit more sport. I'd pay for that.

absolutely. Why was this never an option? Charge 2 pounds a race for HD feeds or, for extra content on the premise that if you don't pay... Sky get the rights and you pay even more.
There are many workable solutions than forking out 800 quid to watch only 0.5 percent of what you are paying for....

[Pup]

Why does the BBC not charge other countries for access to it's coverage?

I cannot help feel this could recoup alot of the outlay, and could possibly even lead to even better coverage?

I'd pay for it. The only BBC we get in the US is a watered down BBC America, which is a mix of a few current BBC shows, a lot of old (antiquated) ones, and even some bizarre old US shows thrown in. I can get some BC radio through Sirius (World Service and BBC1), and I listen to World Service a lot.

BBC is going to allow international iPad subscriptions at some point, but sadly, live sports will not be part of the deal.

There may be some licensing deals that prevent the BBC from joining the US cable lineups, since they have long standing deals in place for individual shows with other US networks, notably PBS/WGBH.

The first thing I did when I read about the Sky deal was to see if I could get Sky Sports added to my cable package. Again, no, but maybe there's a chance that Fox Soccer Plus will carry it, since they have a grab bag of other Sky Sports events. Not holding my breath, though.

If I could reliably stream F1 - races, qually and practices - I'd dump my cable all together and subsist on iTunes, Netflix, etc. F1 is truly the only thing preventing me from doing so. I think there's an opportunity for Bernie in streaming that he's missing out on. MLB must rake in a ton of dough on their MLBtv subscriptions, archaic restrictions and all.

[wesley123]

So I got my bbc 'answer' just an standard 'sorry that you feel like it' answer, probably everyone sending the complaint get exact the same mail back

[i70q7m7ghw]

+1 for a BBC premium channel, I would be more than willing to pay for that rather than buy a whole Sky package which I don't need.

My current option looks like TopUp TV, the advantage being I can cancel it for the months I don't need it. I noticed though they just recently jacked up the prices for Sky Sports!?

[siskue2005]

I feel really sorry for you guys from UK
really bad news

Here in India, we get F1 in HD from hungarian GP onwards

The ESPN HD channel costs only 80 rupees per month, which is 1 Pound per month for F1 alone
Total cost of ENTIRE Channels (including all HD etc etc) will come upto 500 rupees per month..which is around 7.5 Pounds per month.

So for a year it costs only 6000 rupees per Year

Its massively cheap compared to UK!

But ofcourse you dont get free practices ...but i can use a stream for that
But the races are quly are all LIVE.

You guys all should protest and dont buy Sky so that they give up on F1!

[Richard]

siskue2005 - Slingbox and an international friend suddenly become very useful

Unfortunately my brother left Delhi last month.

[SiLo]

If the fans lose interest and don't/can't watch, surely that's enough for them to change their mind? Surely they can't be that stupid?

[i70q7m7ghw]

My understanding is all the teams are getting slipped some money under table in this 'new deal', so they are all taking a short term cash prize, over the long term stability of F1.

The whole thing stinks if you ask me.

[andartop]

--- you very much Bernie, Teams, BBC and Sky!
I'll join everybody else who would rather boycott F1 rather than get Sky, and try to see the races online through "other channels". Internet is our friend indeed. When they ban internet, I'll stop watching F1.
I just pray Moto GP remains free to watch.

[wesley123]

Imo what keeps f1 popular is a simple thing, it os more known compared to ALMS or ILMS or such series, plus races are much shorter than the endurance racing. I really hope the ILMS will get good coverage on tv pretty soon and some sprint races either, I might watch those series instead. The battles and racing in such series is much more interesting, yet it is lacking coverage.

@Diesel; indeed it does, that is why my only logical explaination is that Bernie tries to keep the teams happy by giving them a mill more, he makes sure his retirement funds are okay, he goes and milk the whole sport out and leaves in a few years, leaving a mess behind.

[siskue2005]

siskue2005 - Slingbox and an international friend suddenly become very useful

Unfortunately my brother left Delhi last month.

what is slingbox?

[Pup]

My understanding is all the teams are getting slipped some money under table in this 'new deal', so they are all taking a short term cash prize, over the long term stability of F1.

There's money involved, but I don't think its under the table. The teams get 50% of FOM's media revenue, so it stands to reason that if the combo BBC/Sky deal is worth more than the BBC deal alone, the teams will profit. But of course they have to weigh that income against any potential loss of sponsorship if they think the market will shrink.

I think the teams were far more opposed to pay TV in the past, when they received a much smaller slice of the revenue.

Of course, Bernie and CVC have to weigh the same choice as the teams, since their trackside revenue and race sponsorships are just as dependent on viewership as the teams' individual sponsors. The only difference one could argue is that CVC might take a shorter term view, if they plan to sell the rights to Murdoch or whomever. Of course, the smaller teams that change hands often might take a similar short term view as well.

Really, the only thing that I can see that might pit CVC's wishes against the teams' in this deal is one that was mentioned in an Autosport article someone sent me. That is, this deal means that CVC now has contracts with two of the major media outlets in GB, which limits the teams' options if they were to try again to go it alone once the current Concorde is up.

[donskar]

siskue2005 - Slingbox and an international friend suddenly become very useful

Unfortunately my brother left Delhi last month.

what is slingbox?

Stop the whimpering and the futile emails to BBC. Let's find a a way to fight back. I work in E-Commerce 60-70 hours per week. So I probably know LESS about Internet in general than many of you.

Is there a way to use the Internet to stream all the races (forget qualy and practice for) for FREE? Legally would be best, of course. Quasi-legal worth considering. Come on you hot-shot tech nerds! Let's hear it from you!

[beelsebob]

siskue2005 - Slingbox and an international friend suddenly become very useful

Unfortunately my brother left Delhi last month.

what is slingbox?

Stop the whimpering and the futile emails to BBC. Let's find a a way to fight back. I work in E-Commerce 60-70 hours per week. So I probably know LESS about Internet in general than many of you.

Is there a way to use the Internet to stream all the races (forget qualy and practice for) for FREE? Legally would be best, of course. Quasi-legal worth considering. Come on you hot-shot tech nerds! Let's hear it from you!

Annoyingly, most current free streams use iPlayer as a basis to get hold of the data. Lets hope someone can figure out how to do this by next year.

[wesley123]

Annoyingly, most current free streams use iPlayer as a basis to get hold of the data. Lets hope someone can figure out how to do this by next year.

You can search for an VPN server hosted in england and set up an VPN connection to that server, by that way iPlayer thinks you are in England, allowing you access to iPlayer. Wont be pretty useful though since BBC only broadcasts 10 races per year, and thus only those 10 will be available on iPlayer. Best is to just download a torrent of the race, that is something these tv companies like, even more then non viewers